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Donten ni Warau Episode 3 Recap & Review

“You’ll let go of this hand, grow bigger, and go far away… the one who’ll be left behind… is me.”

Rating: 4.2/5 curiously excited clouds

This week’s episode of Donten ni Warau illustrated exactly just how close and far Soramaru and Tenka are. Soramaru overhears Tenka and Botan’s conversation about Orochi’s vessel but Tenka refuses to let his little brother in on his secrets. While Soramaru feels that Tenka sees him as unreliable, the truth of the matter is that Tenka doesn’t want Soramaru to shoulder this burden.

TENKA IN WESTERN CLOTHING ERMAHGOSH. FANGIRLING SO HARD. That charming man…

I’m surprised Soramaru had the guts to approach the Yamainu and ask them to train him to be stronger despite the tense exchange between his brothers and his former comrades. Master Shi of the Yamainu agrees to train Soramaru in exchange for the boy infiltrating Gokumojou in order to investigate the rumours of the man (or thing) who is… “collecting something.”

Aside from Soramaru’s teenage endeavours to get stronger, we got a lot more scenes with Shirasu, the shinobi of the Fuma clan. I love seeing moments where he demonstrates the utmost loyalty to Tenka because the Fuma clan have had a history of solitary movement. The stark white hair and striking purple eyes make Shirasu all the more intriguing as a character. The back story between Tenka and Shirasu, the friendship, is just too cute.

Soramaru’s decision to infiltrate Gokumonjo scares me. We’ve seen how weak he is in battle with an actual assassin and now he’s going to enter a giant prison complex with hundreds upon thousands of bitter angry criminals who all probably recognize him as one of the escorts. Luckily Chuutaro can’t keep a secret for long and Tenka and Shirasu end up finding out about Soramaru’s plan. Tenka sets out to retrieve his brother but Shirasu volunteers to go as a Fuma shinobi in Tenka’s stead on account of Tenka’s poor health. The master-servant-friendship-bromance between Shirasu and Tenka has me fangirling so hard…

Soramaru ends up having a mental breakdown in the cell when approached by one mysterious inmate. Memories of his past are resurfacing more and more, secrets that Tenka has tried really hard to hide from Soramaru may return… the last scenes after the credits are the most heartbreaking so far because Tenka’s burdened with so much, yet he tries so hard to be the lighthearted and loving caretaker his brothers need him to be and we get a horrendous last scene to cliff-hang us to the series for next week’s episode.